As the 2000 fall sports season gets underway in the Atlantic-10, the Dayton Flyers are expected to put up some stiff competition according to conference head coaches who recently voted on who they think will battle for A-10 supremacy.

The best news is that A-10 coaches respected Dayton athletics enough to vote each Flyer program to do as well or better than last season’s finish. Leading the pack are typical Dayton strengths — soccer and volleyball.

It’s no surprise that Mike Tucker’s womens soccer team was voted as the team to beat this year. With the conference’s best player and Hermann Trophy finalist Missy Showtime Gregg, and Stephanie Weisenfeld, the league’s best goalkeeper, many feel Dayton can pull off the double-sweep for the second season in a row, that is, winning the regular season and conference tournament titles. With a freshmen class highlighted by two-time HS All-American Judi Aschenbrener, it’s likely that UD will continue to be favorites in the coming years.

The Dayton mens soccer team, under the direction of first-year Head Coach Dave Schureck, was picked to finish in second place, behind last year’s A-10 champ Rhode Island. The Rams are currently ranked #25 in the nation. The Flyers are coming off a 9-7-2 season including a 5-5-1 record in conference play. With a strong core of returning players and one of the best incoming classes in the program’s history, Schureck is expected to produce results early and often — at least according to his peers. Schureck takes over for the departed Jim Launder, who resigned from Dayton after honoring his three-year term to return to Wisconsin to head youth soccer. Launder won a national title at Wisconsin before arriving at Dayton.

A consistent winner since the university joined the league, the UD womens volleyball team was picked to finish second in the Atlantic-10 after a 14-13 (10-8) finish in 1999. Two years ago the Flyers were one of the last teams bumped from an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament and Head Coach Pete Hoyer is hoping this is the year Dayton has what it takes to go dancing. The Flyers tied for the conference title in 1998, and have developed several players into A-10 stars including the Atlantic 10 Player of the Year in 1997 (Zhaohui Ma) and 1998 (Carla Muntz) as well as the Atlantic-10 Rookie of the Year in 1996 (Ou Huang) and 1998 (Katie Ferreill). The Temple Owls were picked to repeat as conference champions this year, coming off an impressive 25-6 (16-2) season.

In other sports, A-10 coaches picked the UD womens cross country team to finish 5th out of 10 schools, equaling last season result. Among the private schools, Dayton trailed only LaSalle and St. Joseph’s in this year’s voting.

Conference coaches picked Dayton to finish sixth out of 10 programs in mens cross country, two spots better than last year’s result (8th). Among private institutions, Dayton ranks fourth of seven schools.

The only other fall sport, field hockey, is not contested by the Flyers.

The University of Dayton finished 5th in the 1999 Commissioner’s Cup race, the school’s highest finish ever. Two seasons ago, Dayton finished the fall sports season with the most points in the A-10.